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(FM19) The Fallen Giants Tour - forgotten league champions edition


noikeee

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Hello there, you may remember me from a series of career threads over the years. In fact I had one earlier with FM19, but although I've kept contact with some of you guys, I lost interest in FM for a while and have been out of this forum section altogether for a couple of months. Now that the final patch is out I feel it's time to come back, with a new idea.

"New idea" might be pushing it since this is heavily inspired by @ManUtd1's series of "Nearly Men", in which he manages the teams that in the past fell just short of winning the European Champions Cup and Champions League. This is kind of similar as I'll be managing clubs with a similar profile, but the pattern is slightly different - I'll be managing clubs that HAVE tasted success, but just not for a long time: all clubs I'll manage, have been national champions in the past at some point, but not for at least 20 years.

... that's also the only rule in this thread. I don't have a shopping list of clubs that I have to tick to complete a challenge, I also can freely abandon any club at any time, although obviously the goal is to get them to win the league again at least. It's really just a journeyman with one restriction in the choice of clubs.

To start off this saga, we'll head off to Eastern Europe... or is that more precisely Central Europe... I can never tell where Centre and East are divided...

Also please don't judge me on the appalling banner, it was quite literally done in MS Paint in 5 minutes. World class graphic design.

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Hradec Králové, Czech Republic, 4th of June 2018

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Well I had everything set to start off in Switzerland, even loaded the game and all, only to realise the club I was going to take over was already part of the top division, when I wanted to start a little lower. Sooooo.... I scrapped the idea of chocolates and clocks and headed a little further East to the Czech Republic. Bonus points for that being one of the few European nations I've never played in.


The club

In case you hadn't noticed I'm applying the term "fallen giants" rather liberally. FC Hradec Králové's greatest success came in 1960 when they won their one and only Czechoslovak title (note - this means they have only been national champions of a nation that no longer exists). This led to a surprisingly good European Champions Cup campaign, falling in the quarter-finals at the hands of Barcelona. And then that was it, they fell into obscurity apart from brief success in 1995, when they won one of the first editions of the Czech Cup, now as a free nation independent of those annoying Slovaks.

 

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More recently the club has been in an impressively consistent yo-yo between the top league and the Czech 2nd tier, and come from a 4th place in the "FORTUNA:NÁRODNÍ LIGA" last year. As such, we are one of the prime candidates for promotion.


The squad

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It's a fairly short squad (notice the guys on dark blue don't count, they're out on loan), but does seem to fit a 4-2-3-1 shape I've been testing around. However I've been testing around at the very highest level with Dortmund and world class players, so am probably here for a shock...


The stars

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... because this is the kind of "star player" we have here. Can tackle. Can run. That's it. Decent LB.

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The equivalent on the other flank, he can also cross a ball though. But can't tackle. Haven't decided yet if he'll be the RB or winger.

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This guy seems to think he's a midfielder but really, forget about it, he's got to be a winger.

 

The finances

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u wot m8. This is actually pretty good. The Czechs seem to be really strict with their finances, wage budget is limited to a percentage of club turnover as per the league rules. What's this, rules to ensure clubs are sustainable entities run in a sensible manner? Madness.


The goals for this season

We're predicted to finish 3rd, top 2 goes up, I am ambitious, I want to go up.


The tactics

.... specially because I have a set of tactics ready to go, tested successfully at the top level. I'm going to be honest, I just couldn't build a decent tactic that was satisfying on my own, so just nicked one of @knap's and then tweaked it a little (with 1 or 2 tips from @BoxToBox as well). Changed the set pieces a little too to make it less OP. Currently I have the current buffet of tactics, which are really all 3 the same but with slightly different profiles for different matches.

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Right. On to attack the first season!!

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10 hours ago, withnail316 said:

Welcome back, man. Looking forward to this. 

 

8 hours ago, B.W.G said:

Best of luck in the Czech Republic :thup:

 

 

6 hours ago, Deisler26 said:

:eek: A @noikeee thread??? Sign me up!

 

Ohhhh, look who's here, the same old farts who've been here for years and years. :D 

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Hradec Kralove - Pre-season 2018/2019


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I hired 6 guys, 4 of the frees, 1 loan, and then I splashed 115K€ on one guy too.
 

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On hindsight this was an unnecessary transfer, we have good depth at the base of midfield.
 

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Because I also hired this guy. However he might be fighting for a starting spot as BBM, despite his 33 years of age.
 

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The real star signing, I spent a lot on him (115K is a pretty big fee for a club like us), he is pretty much ideal as AML IF/S and can also play very well as AMC where he will most likely fit. However he then picked up immediately an injury to stop him for 2 months...
 

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A pretty expensive loan as we'll have to pay 5K/month in wages+a fee to his parent club, but he's a good fit as striker in my opinion, it's pretty crucial in a lone striker system to have a guy that is both quick and can do well in the air.
 

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An alternate striker, not as good in the air, not as good a finisher, but really really quick.
 

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I had to promise him a starter spot. I lied, he'll be our backup LB.

 

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The squad is looking like this now, I'm happy I think, there's a decent amount of options and no massive misfits, but I haven't yet really had a chance to compare against the rest of this league.
 

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Hard to read anything from this pre-season, we smashed a lot of tiny sides, but got beat the two times we played good teams - although Young Boys and Mattersburg are from a top division and we aren't, so I think our performance wasn't too terrible.

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Hradec Kralove - July 2018

 

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Well this is a pretty bad start! We struggled to break down Sokolov until we finally did it, but then squandered the lead with a late goal; and then at Brno we managed to recover from being 2 goals down only to concede a late goal - they have a crazy good striker with jumping of 18 and generally attributes of a much higher level and his late header ruined us.

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Hradec Kralove - August 2018


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A much better month with loads of goals, specially in the heavy wins over Viktoria Zizkov and Vitkovice - forward Jakub Sasinka has looked a very handy signing so far. We did however fail to break down the Vlasim bus, and before that got knocked out of the cup by Jihlava, as we couldn't hold on to a 1-0 lead after an early red card. Remarkably later in the month we faced Jihlava again, and again picked up a red card whilst ahead, but this time not only held on to the lead, but also extended it to a 3-1 win!

With 14 points from 7 matches we're in the fight for the playoff places, which is where we want to be at the end of the season.


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Czech Republic is fun, but wait until you see the match scheduling after getting into Continental Cups....(3-4 matches a week)

Also realize that you will be selling your wonderkids to everyone because even Saudi Clubs scout the Czech Republic!

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21 hours ago, oriole01 said:

Great idea, great choice of starting club, uncommon nation to manage in... you've got me on board. Best of luck in your restoration projects.

 

2 hours ago, Nobby_McDonald said:

I really like this idea. I don't follow many careers outside the UK but I will follow this one. Good luck.

Cheers more old faces! :D 

4 hours ago, Hootieleece said:

Czech Republic is fun, but wait until you see the match scheduling after getting into Continental Cups....(3-4 matches a week)

Also realize that you will be selling your wonderkids to everyone because even Saudi Clubs scout the Czech Republic!

Weellll.. I guess that makes it a little challenging then.

I usually don't get super annoyed at overly crammed fixture lists, I tend to have ridiculously large squad so lots of matches is a good way to rotate.

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Hradec Kralove - September 2018
 

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I made a little blunder on the transfer market. Having a brilliant AMC lined up to join on a free, I decided to sell AMC Adam Vlkanova, who was 2nd choice but had started the season pretty well, to league rivals Jihlava. Then... the new AMC for some unknown reason will only join in January so I have no decent backup for the position now.

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The new guy. He's on holidays until January. He's also very, very good.

 

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Ballin'! Czeching out all the fun in this division! It's 3 straight wins as we shoot up to the top of the table. Again Prostejov it was weird as we got the early goals but then also an early red card and just about held on (we're picking up a few too many red cards! I could perhaps manage the "get stuck in" instruction a bit better!); whereas against Trinec it was almost the other way around, the goals coming late. Against Chrudim we went a goal down, but later a cunning plan of dropping mentality from Attacking to Positive was all it took to start breaking them down spectacularly well.

Life's good. We're on a rhythm now. I'm also enjoying how little tactical changes here and there are actually making a huge difference (although I still dislike many quirks in this ME). I don't want to brag myself up that much, as I just nicked someone else's ridiculously strong tactical basis to work with from the beginning, but what beat Trinec's narrow bus (3-6-1 diamond) was a change to Otto Urma from WB/S to WB/A and off he went scoring a goal like he's Jordi Alba running into the keepers' box; whilst that little change of mentality unlocked Chrudim (who lined up on a defensive 4-4-2 with double DMs). Nice.
 

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Hradec Kralove - October 2018

 

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Two wins by 3-1 and in-between, a less impressive home 0-0 draw as we failed to break down Taborsko. We're perhaps relying on set pieces a little two much lately, against Varnsdorf it was two free kicks by an inspired Fahrudin Gjurgjevic (the second was called as an owngoal as it bounced off the keeper), and against Znojmo it was 2 penalties both converted by RB Marek Plasil - AMC Josef Bazal had scored a brilliant solo goal before, though. 

We remain 1st, chased closely by Jihlava and Pardubice.

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Hradec Kralove - November 2018


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This on paper looked like as difficult a month as it gets, away to 3 teams fighting at the top end of the table. Instead we repeated our favourite result 3-1 twice yet again, then picked up one of the biggest wins of the season with a 4-0 over Sokolov. Inside forward Gjurgjevic and attacking midfielder Bazal have been immense in particular.

With all of this we've opened up a really nice gap at the top, as we start to aim for 1st place and automatic promotion. The bad news? A 3 months winter break starts now. Ugh.

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